Galveston Island State Park is one of the several state parks in Texas offering coastline to the Gulf of Mexico. The park is good to visit during any time of the year, and offers several hiking, biking and paddling trails. In order to take advantage of the paddling trails you must bring your own kayak.

The park has two different parts. There is the beach side which has sand dunes and prairie type landscape. On the back side of the island, where the majority of the hike and bike trails are, is a great habitat for wildlife such as fish, birds and crustaceans (Blue Crab & Fiddler Crab).

The trails are fairly short, and if you have 2 hours to hike you will be able to hit all of them. We started on the Freshwater Pond Loop trail followed by the Prairie Trail, and finished up with Duck Lake. All of the trails will offer footbridges across the ponds and marshes, and views of the wildlife that call the park their home.

For a look into all of the multi-use trails check out the park's map here.

Pack List

Hiking shoes

Water

Camera

Bathing Suit if planning on swimming

Binoculars for wildlife viewing

$5 for Entrance Fee or Texas Parks Pass

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How to Get There

Reviews

We have went to the pint indicated in the map, but we only found a camping side and some fisherman alongside the nord part of the peninsula. Afterword we hit the Jamaica beach and it was really cool. Nevertheless if we could have found any of the trails that would have been an awesome experience.